Action plan identifies 2019 as deadline for major changes at TPS

A task force charged with finding ways to modernize policing and tame the Toronto Police Service’s $1-billion budget has identified 2019 as the deadline for the full implementation of its recommendations.

On Thursday, the Transformational Task Force released a final report titled “Action Plan: The Way Forward.”

The 33-page document endorses the 24 recommendations that were made in an interim report in June and outlines a plan for their full implementation.

In 2017, the report says that police should formally hand over control of the $6.8 million school crossing guard program to the city and invest in modern technology that will make it easier for members of the public to interact with officers through “video calling, social media, and the Toronto Police Services app.”

Meanwhile, in 2018 the report says that the TPS should hand over the responsibility for its $1.1 million lifeguard program to the City of Toronto and develop new capabilities for data analysis that will allow for the delivery of “evidence-based policing services where they are needed most.”

The report also says that police should shed 450 uniformed officers by 2019 through attrition and maintain a three-year freeze on non-essential promotions.

“When we look at the ‘serve and protect’ I think we protect really well, which is why we are the safest urban city, but that service piece needs to be fixed. It is not just what we do anymore but how we do what we do that becomes the more important component,” Chief Mark Saunders told reporters on Thursday. “Understanding relationships, understanding our role in the community and understanding how we can add value is critical when it comes to that.”

Significant changes planned for 2019

Some of the more ambitious changes proposed by the task force aren’t scheduled to be completed until 2019.

Those changes include redrawing some divisional boundaries and closing police stations, equipping officers with so-called "eNotebooks" that will reduce the need for cruisers, and using civilian employees rather than costlier uniformed personnel to “follow up on non-emergency neighbourhood safety incidents.”

More generally, the report calls for a shift in the TPS’s service-delivery model, which will make neighbourhood policing a priority.

As part of that change, new officers will have to walk the beat for at least a year and officers will be kept in one neighbourhod for at least three years at a time.

"It may look a step back in time when officers walked the beat," Staff-Sgt. Gregory Watts, who is a member of the panel, told reporters. "But it worked then and it can work now."

Union has opposed recommendations

While Saunders and other TPS leaders have said that the task force is all about modernizing policing, the union representing front-line officers has claimed that it's really about cutting costs at the expense of public safety.

Speaking with CP24 about the report on Thursday, Toronto Police Association President Mike McCormack said he believes the report is “nothing more than cuts thinly veiled as transformation.”

“There is no question that we have to modernize. We have to look at technology and we have to look at what is the best way to police. We support that principal but let’s look at that in a thoughtful, evidence-based way,” he said. “That hasn’t been done. This has been done to eliminate a portion of the budget.”

The report was presented to the Toronto Police Services board on Thursday but will not actually be discussed until February.

Discussing the recommendations with reporters at police headquarters, Mayor Tory described them as a “huge step forward” when packaged together.

He said that once fully implemented the changes will create a culture focused on “transparency” with a “renewed focus on community and neighbourhood policing”

Tory also said that police will “embark on an unprecedented consultation with rank-and-file” officers to make their interests are kept in mind during the implementation of the recommendations.

“We need to make sure we do this right and take advantage of their expertise and their knowledge,” he said.

The report calls on the TPS board to appoint an “independent advisor” to provide it with “advice and perspective” on the implementation of the recommendations. The report also says that the TPS should update the board on their progress quarterly and make a scorecard publically available, so taxpayers can track the progress.